In my previous discussion of the Moon's inner world, Va-Nah, I talked about
the ‘physics’ that might shape this fictional world, the same ‘physics’
that shaped Pellucidar, and of how the two inner worlds are similar and
different.

In this discussion, I wish to explore the flora and fauna of this strange
twin to Pellucidar, and perhaps reconstruct the hidden history of life
and civilization here.

Plant
Life on the Moon

In marked contrast to the animal life, plant life on the Moon is both
diverse and highly adapted. There are, for instance, tough hardy
plants which are able to exist on the surface in an atmosphere too thin
to support life, and which sprout and grow to hundreds of feet during the
short sidereal day of 14 terrestrial days. Their ability to
survive the savage extremes of temperatures is nothing short of remarkable.

On the inside, there is a wild diversity of plant life, including grasses,
bushes, shrubs, fleshy trees, as well as plants producing large quantities
of edible berries, fruit and nuts. There are also edible roots.
Plants grow thickly, organizing into grasslands and dense forests.
There are even flowering plants. The plant kingdom approaches the
diversity and sophistication of Earth. In short, the lushness
and diversity of the plant kingdom stands in marked contrast to the threadbare
wretches that make up the remaining animal fauna. This remains
one of the major paradoxes of the Moon.

There are likely two strong points of departure between Earth plants
and Lunar plants. Lunar plants do not use chlorophyll and are
not green. Based on this, they do not appear to be (on the interior
at least) employing photosynthesis. We believe that they are
actually deriving their energy from collecting and absorbing static energy
and are engaged in electrosynthesis. However, that aside, their
metabolic processes, growth patterns and life cycles simply seem to be
the same as those on Earth.

The other strong point of departure, although little is made of it,
is that due to lesser lunar gravity, far less structural strength is required
to support plants. Therefore, they tend to be fleshy rather
than woody. Lunar trees are not particularly strong and do
not make good building materials nor effective bows or arrows, although
they can make a serviceable spear.

Due to the lack of seasonal or diurnal variation, plants are essentially
growth opportunists, whose progress is determined by local variations in
moisture.

Critters
on the Moon

"Silly looking beggar," remarked Jay.
"And devilish unearthly."

"I don't know about that," I returned. "He
(the snake) possessed nothing visible to us that we are not familiar with
on Earth. Possibly he was assembled after a slightly different plan
from any Earth creature; but aside from that, he is familiar to us, even
to his amphibious habits. And these flying toads too, what
of them? I see nothing particularly remarkable about them.
We have just as strange forms on Earth, though nothing precisely like these."
(Chapter Three)

In the Moon's interior, only five creatures are described, and they
appear to constitute literally the whole of the major animal species.
These consist of three reptiles and two mammals:

A flying toad;

A four legged snake;

The Tor-Ho a lynx or cougar sized catlike reptilian predator;

Va Ga, a quadruped mammalian species with human faces and intelligence;

Humans.

Is this the whole of it? Just about.

There is a hint that there might be animal or insect life on the surface
of the moon, but it is no more than an unverified suggestion.

Julian mentions insects or insect life, but doesn't say much more about
them. In particular, there are some notable absences.
There is no mention of pollinating insects like bees, although there are
flowers. There is also no mention of colonial insects like
ants or termites, or swarming insects like locusts, nor of primeval ‘large’
insects, nor of eating insects for food by either the meat starved Va-Gas
or Humans. At best, what we can infer of the insect life of
Va-Nah is that it is small, unobtrusive and not terribly important.

He also makes references to other reptiles occasionally, but none of
these are described or given much detail. From the lack of
attention, we can only assume that any other reptiles are much smaller
and less common than the toad and the snake. These other unidentified
reptiles are also noted to have poisonous flesh.

Both the flying toad and the four legged snake are frequently referred
to and occasionally seen. The predator, the Tor-ho is much
feared but seldom encountered, its diet, we are told, consists primarily
of the toad and snake (although it seems quite willing to dine on Human
and Va-Gas), it too is poisonous. None of these
reptilian creatures is terribly large. One would think at one
sixth gravity, that we might see creatures so colossal that elephants and
dinosaurs would be dwarfed.

The only truly dominant and common species seen in large numbers or
in large sizes are the Va Ga and the Humans. They have the
distinction of being different from all of the other named or referenced
species in being mammals, and appear to be vastly more advanced than the
reptiles they share the world with.

The sheer volume and variety of plants, and the ready availability of
water and different sorts of habitats, from forests to jungles, plains,
valleys, mountainsides, rivers lakes and oceans, that there would be a
vast plethora of creatures, and some quite gigantic creatures.

In fact, there is a sophisticated and complex diversity of plant species,
with a wide variety of plants, trees, grasses, shrubs, bushes, fruits,
flowers and vegetables, all of which are suggestive of a complex and fully
developed ecology. And yet, there are practically no animals.

We should expect to see similar species, but instead, we go from flying
toads, to snakes, to reptile-cats, to humans to strange quadrupeds.
There are no related species or intermediate species, like apes and monkeys
to humans, lions to tigers, dolphins to whales, foxes to wolves, cows to
horses. There are not even distantly related, but still obviously
kin species like rabbits to dear or dogs to cats. The very
few animals that exist seem widely separated and almost completely unrelated
to each other, apart from being broadly reptilian or mammalian.

What's going on?

Illustrations from the original Argosy magazine appearance
in 1925

The
Va-Nah Mass Extinction

In fact, there is evidence of other species having existed on the moon.

"The furniture, though of peculiar design and
elaborately carved with strange figures of unearthly beasts and reptiles...."
(Chapter 9)

Obviously, these are antiques dating back to the days when ‘unearthly
beasts and reptiles’ now extinct still existed or were only recently lost.
Further, there appear to be oral traditions of previous forms of life:

"There is no animal in that part of the interior
lunar world with which I am familiar, that they may eat with safety.
The flying toad and the walking snake and the other reptilia are poisonous,
and they dare not eat them. The time had been, I later learned,
possibly, however, ages before, when many other animals roamed the surface
of the inner Moon, but all had become extinct, except our captors and another
creature...." (Chapter Three)

Mass extinctions are common in both our world and Burroughs. Our
world has experienced at least six mass extinctions, including the Permian
and Mezosoic extinctions where something like 90% of principal species
died off. Entire lines of creatures, from Trilobites and mammal-like
reptiles, to Dinosaurs and Pterosaurs vanished in a flash.

Barsoom in its desert state has clearly undergone a mass extinction.
The formerly rich and diverse flora and fauna are now reduced to a handful
of biological islands, like Kamtol, Valley Dor, the Toonolian Marshes,
etc., and vast empty lands occupied only by hardy mosses and hardier desert
species.

But the lunar mass extinction takes the cake, with literally only a
tiny handful of mostly small indigenous species out of uncounted hundreds
surviving. The scale of the extinction is even more remarkable
considering the survival of such a wide range of plant life.

While it is never specifically acknowledged, the clear implication is
that all of the other species extant were hunted to extinction and devoured
by the ravenous Va-Gas and perhaps the Human populations.

While it is tempting, within the context of the Moon Maid, to blame
the rapacious Va-Gas only, the evidence of the carved furniture suggests
that other animal life persisted in reasonable profusion at least to the
period of human civilization. Which, in turn implies that humans
may have had something to do with mass extinction.

So, in addition to the Va-Gas hunting, we might also consider malthusian
overpopulation by both Va-Gas and Humans, as well as pollution, habitat
destruction, disruption of migration routes and mating areas and other
activities of civilization which have tended to push species to extinction.

Certainly by the time of Julian we have a grim ecology peopled only
by a few relict reptiles, and by two apex species who have been reduced
to devouring each other and themselves.

Reptiles,
the Original Ecology?

One of the puzzles of Va-nah is that setting aside humans and va-gas,
all of the other species remaining appear to be fairly primitive reptiles.
A serpent which retains four small legs is hardly on the cutting edge of
design.

While it is impossible to draw analogies of complexity from terrestrial
to reptilian forms, one can still make some general inferences.
The forms that we see, with the possible exception of the Tor-Ho, are essentially
‘spawlers’, their skeletons are not engineered to support their weight.

Generally,
in vertebrate evolution, higher reptiles and mammals have their limbs placed
directly beneath their bodies, so that they can stand easily with little
or no effort. The work of defying gravity is done not by muscles,
but by the bones of the legs, allowing muscles to focus on propulsion.
For this reason, sprawlers on land require far more energy to move around,
and move less efficiently and less quickly, which puts an upper size limit
on them. Komodo Dragons and Crocodiles are as big as you get
with sprawlers, and in the case of Crocodiles, they are semi-aquatic.

Because sprawlers skeletons are not engineered efficiently, we usually
see other primitive or less effective anatomical features, such as cold
bloodedness, inefficient lungs, tiny brains, poor neural systems, inefficient
circulatory systems. The general rule of thumb is that if a
creature has not been able to manage something as urgent as skeletal efficiency,
it's probably not doing great guns anywhere else.

And in fact, this seems to be the case. Even the Tor Ho, the reptilian
equivalent of a lynx, is referred to as being cold-blooded, and its relentlessness
in the face of damage suggests that it wasn't a very smart creature.
There is no indication of its stance, but the fact that it is an ‘ambush’
predator suggests that it is not terribly good at running around.
At heart, it's not terribly sophisticated, it's just a mean lizard.

But is this representative of the Moon's previous fauna?
The lunar ecology is in the aftermath of mass extinctions, and these forms
are merely the survivors of a panoply of more advanced, bigger and tougher
forms.

It is indeed possible that there were more advanced reptiles and animals.
But it also seems clear that these other reptiles, whatever their advantages,
were no match for the Va-Gas or the Humans. Accordingly, we
must infer that they were relatively delicate species in comparison to
the dominant mammals, eventually pushed to extinction.

Indeed, a flying toad appears to be a fairly advanced and sophisticated
creature. Although undoubtedly a cold blooded reptile, the
reduced lunar gravity ensured that even its primitive metabolism had the
energy for powered flight. The Tor-Ho also appears to be relatively
sophisticated, and likely a respectable predator in pre-mass extinction
days.

In short, while the surviving reptiles seem primitive, slow and stupid
by our standards, it is likely that they were effectively state of the
art for their ecology, prior to the humans and va-gas. In short,
we can reasonably assume that the whole of the ecology was operating on
a rough level of sophistication.

Of course, we're just guessing. In our world, crude lizards,
snakes and turtles eke out an existence among a variety of high powered
mammals, and the crocodile manages to be an apex predator of swamps and
rivers, pulling down far more evolved mammals. We can't tell
for sure.

But the evidence for any more sophisticated ecology, or sophisticated
fauna, is pretty thin. In fact, there are only three possible hints
that the ecology might have had more sophisticated animals:
(1) The plant ecology is highly complex; (2) Humans and/or Va-Gas
had to come from somewhere; and (3) The carved furniture referred to ‘reptiles
and unearthly beasts’, suggesting non-reptilians. Frankly,
that's just thin.

On the other hand, the issue may be decided by the flying toads.
The air is a competitive niche. If there had been effective warm
blooded creatures around, pterosaurs, bats, birds or some equivalent, it
is likely that they would have shoved the flying toads out of their niches
and into extinction. I can't see the flying toads occupying
their niche if there was anything else around that was substantially more
competitive. Crocodiles, when they could not compete with fleet
wolves, tigers and lions found safety in the water. There's no safe
refuge in the air.

The survivors of the mass-extinction, by and large, are a pretty glum
and retiring bunch. It is clear that their survival was due not to
any special abilities or adaptations, nor to any lack thereof, but simply
to having poisonous flesh.
Setting that aside, we can only infer that they were neither more primitive
nor more sophisticated than their extinct cousins.

The
Poison Game of Survivors

There is some additional indirect evidence for this. Most of the
lunar fauna that we see, the serpent, the toad, and the cat creature are
poisonous. Now, it's possible that their poisonous nature is
simply the result of biological differences between their flesh and the
flesh of the mammals. In which case, its clear that the two
mammals are not indigenous to the ecology. Obviously, if you
can't eat the home grown dishes, you’re not from the neighborhood.

The implication is pretty clear in the Moon Maid that this
catastrophic extinction was caused by the Va-Ga or Humans or both literally
wiping out every other species. This seems to suggest that
the other species were edible, or at least, more edible. If the other
species were generally inedible, then we would have expected more of them
to have survived.

Or it may have been that the poison was a defense mechanism.
Poison is a relatively complex strategy, not least because it may not be
terribly effective for the individual creature. Particularly
if your poison is in your flesh. You can't reproduce if you're
being vomited up by a dying or horribly sick predator. Maybe the
next of your species won't be eaten by that predator, but it hasn't done
you much good.

Sure, you're thinking to yourself, “Get bit by a black mamba, and see how
effective that is!” But the thing is, that in the two or five
or ten or fifteen or thirty seconds it takes for the Mamba venom to paralyse
and disable, you've got time to kill that Mamba dead. Predators
can be blindingly fast, particularly when hurt, and they are well equipped
to kill. This is why most poisonous creatures tend not to go
looking for trouble.

Insects of course, wasps, spiders, etc., are far more proficient with
poison attacks. But then again, they deliver comparatively huge doses
of poison, and their designated victims are small enough that the poison
works effectively instantaneously, and their biologies are rude enough
that the cruder options of tooth and claw aren't necessarily effective.
Your typical insect is armoured with chitin, barely has a circulatory or
respiratory system and may survive (for a while) losing its head or major
limbs. Poison is the best option for wasps. For
bigger creatures, it's a different story.

And you might be thinking “Well, a really effective poison could kill
instantly.” The trouble is that most of the time, it takes
a while to evolve a really effective poison. Consequently,
your forbears with their less effective poison are dying right and left.
It makes about as much sense as evolving flight by throwing babies off
a cliff.

The simpler trend for vertebrate evolution is to get bigger, to get
faster, to develop claws, teeth, horns, you name it. Creatures
that evolve poison as weapons of offence or defense have pretty much been
backed into a corner in evolutionary terms. You're a snake?
Well, talons and claws are right out, aren’t they. Horns and armour
are locked off. You can't deliver much of a bite. What the
hell is left?

So, if we've got poisonous creatures dominating the remnant lunar ecology,
that tends to imply that at some point in their evolutionary history, their
backs were up against the wall as a result of creatures better with tooth
and claw. The existence of poison creatures points the way
to a more robust and diverse ecology, and more robust and diverse creatures,
most of which seems not to be around any more.

By robust and diverse, of course, I don't necessarily mean evolutionarily
sophisticated. I just mean that whatever was around in terms
of predators, had bigger claws, bigger teeth, faster reflexes, and were
just generally bigger and meaner.

Could the poison creatures have eventually used their asset to dominate
the ecology? Unlikely, they've got too many apparent structural
handicaps, and frankly, they haven't done especially well dealing with
humans. The simple fact that they evolved poison as a defense
suggests that they were outgunned. It's not likely that they'd
be able to handle really tough little bastards like Rats. What
they've got, at best, is a single advantage that allowed them to survive
the big mass extinctions.

There were almost certainly more robust and diverse forms, but then
again, its not likely that the old ecology was filled with creatures substantially
more complex or advanced. Otherwise, Julian would be facing
the equivalent of rats, rabbits, weasels and raccoons.... Tough hardy
general purpose opportunists, and quite possibly poisonous.
Instead, he's facing what are in Earth terms, the low power ‘also rans’
who were merely good at finding a place to hide out.

So what was the pre-extinction Lunar Ecology like? Probably
lots of sprawlers. The low lunar gravity would make it comparatively
easy for sprawlers to reach large sizes, and would delay the emergence
of ‘straight legged’ types. Probably a lot of lizard
type creatures, turtles, snakes, frogs, etc. Think of Earth during
the early Permian period.

Easy prey for the emergence of humans and va gos.

The
Human Puzzle

In the city of Laythe, a wise man begins a conversation with Julian,
intrigued by his claim to be from another world.

"There are fragmentary, extremely fragmentary,
legends handed down from extreme antiquity which suggest that our remote
ancestors had some knowledge concerning the other worlds of which you speak,"
the said, "but these have always been considered the veriest of myths.
Can it be possible that after all they are based upon truth."

In other words, there are hints in the legends of worlds outside of
Va-Nah. That Va-Nah might not be the sum total of the Universe.

"If what you tell me is the truth, for our legends
bear out the theory that Va-Nah is located in the center of an enormous
globe and that our earliest progenitors lived upon the outer surface of
this globe, being forced at last, by some condition which the legends do
not even suggest, to find their way into this inner world."

Here our native of Laythe begins to speculate. The only
thing the legend says clearly is that they're living inside of an enormous
globe. He isn't claiming that the legends say that his ancestors
lived on the surface of the moon, this is merely the conclusion he draws.
At best, the legends seem to suggest that the early humans lived on the
surface of a world, not necessarily this one. Also, note the
admission that the legends are silent as to how or why humans wound up
inside the moon. They have no clue.

"If you reached us from another world, is it then
so difficult to believe that those who preceded us reached Va-nah from
the outer crust of this Moon?"

A wild eyed speculation which, alchemically transforms into:

"It is almost a historic certainty,” he
continued, “that our ancestors possessed great ships which navigated
the air. As you entered Vah-nah by means of a similar conveyance
may not they have done likewise."

Except of course, that for all his ‘historic certainty’, there are not
even legends of his ancestors entering Va-Nah, nor of how or why they did
so. Thus, the wise man of Va-nah proves himself fully human
by engaging in that time honoured sport, jumping to conclusions.

The thing, of course, is that humans are pretty much inconsistent with
our picture so far of the lunar ecology. If indeed the surviving
reptiles are representative of a Permian era level of development, and
they seem to be, then we are approximately two hundred million years out
of place. We don't fit. And for that matter, neither
do the Va-gas.

So? What else is new? Humans stick out like a sore
thumb on Barsoom, on Thuria, on Poloda, on Venus and even Jupiter.
Earth is about the only place we can definitely say that humans fit in.

Obviously, then humans are from Earth. And its likely that
humans are only recent immigrants to the moon from Earth.

For one thing, lunar humans are still skeletally designed for Earth
gravity. Look at it this way, take your average 150 lb
to 200 lb human, scale their weight up instantly to 900 to 1200 lbs, and
watch their legs snap like breadsticks, watch them struggle to breath,
watch their lungs fill with fluids. A lunar creature evolved
or fully adapted for lunar gravity simply won't survive.

However, a terrestrial evolved creature which has not been on the moon
long enough to lose its heavy gravity adaptations would survive the return
to Earth. It might not be happy, but eventually, its muscles
would re-adapt, and succeeding generations would dance like they'd never
been away.

The fact that the Kalkars can survive on Earth, much less conquer it, suggests
that they and other lunar humans are from Earth originally, and have not
been on the moon long enough for the heavy gravity adaptations to be lost.
There is some indication, however, that the heavy gravity adaptations were
being diluted. The great size of some Kalkars is suggestive.

The fact that lunar humans and terrestrial humans are both sexually
and reproductively compatible is the final cinch. In the Moon
Maid, moon people are sexually attractive and beautiful to terrestrial
men. In fact, the moon maid herself is attracted to the comely
earth man. Clearly standards of beauty are just about identical,
as are romance and courtship.

Further, as we see in "Red Hawk," the Kalkars are genetically and reproductively
compatible with humans to the extent that after a few hundred years, they
are almost a completely hybridized race.

In short, by every possible yardstick the lunar humans are identical
to earth humans.

It is impossible to see the lunar humans as independently evolved, although
Julian at one point seems to think so. Even were humans to
independently evolve, they certainly would not evolve out of such a primitive
ecology, would not evolve to such terrestrial standards of beauty, would
not evolve adapted to earth life and earth gravity, and would not evolve
to reproduce with us..

The only conclusion is that they are a derivative population, as, probably,
are most of the other human populations in the solar system.

Of course, this doesn't explain how humans were able to arrive.
Clearly, if they didn't evolve on the Moon. They must have come from
Earth. But if so, how? The lunar civilization has no
coherent record or legends of origins somewhere else. Their
journey to Va-nah obviously preceded their civilization, and preceded the
discovery of writing. Otherwise there would have been written
documents carved in stone or impressed on clay tablets or handed down to
be copied and recopied. The Va-nah peoples do not even really believe
that outer space or other worlds exist.

Although they have a high civilization, or at least, had a high technological
civilization, it appears that this high technology was indigenous and not
external. In short, there is no indication that their race
achieved space travel and settled the moon. Another possibility
is that aliens transported them, but again, the presence of such aliens
is not even hinted.

The
Problem of the Va Ga

And
they are a big problem. Taxonomically, they are like no other
creatures known in the solar system. The best we can come up
with is that they're sort of like a big hoofed bear hominid.

What can we determine about them? Well, they have human
faces, human or near human intelligence, a history of tool use, a mammalian
four limbed body plan. On those particular criteria, we might ascribe
Va Ga to the human species. However, clearly they are not human
and their quadrupedalism takes them entirely out of the human line.
They aren't even knuckle walkers like apes.

On the other hand, their social and reproductive behaviour, including
herds and bull/harem groupings are more suggestive of hoofed herbivore
mammals. Their reduction of digits is also a sign of
herbivore evolution.

They are not bipeds, though capable of bipedal stances and movement.
In this respect, they seem to be like bears. And like
bears, they are omnivorous. But clearly, they are not ursines.
They display a range of skeletal, anatomical and behavioural features common
to Earth mammals.

But they don't seem to fit comfortably in any Earth taxonomy.
Like humans on the moon, and unlike the green men on Barsoom, they seem
to stick out like a sore thumb in the ecology. Moreover, they appear
completely foreign to the ecology of Barsoom, which is characterized by
multi-legged forms, and alien to Venus.

In short, there is no possible way they can be anything but Earth derived,
but they don't seem to have any close relatives in Earth terms.

Given that their closest relatives in the lunar ecology are humans,
the temptation is to describe them as a radically adapted offshoot of the
human line. This is, in fact, an idea that Burroughs,
through both Julian and Orthis are playing with.

This is not out of the question. Human/Mammal adaptations
might be so superior to those of the existing lunar fauna that one could
see human variants diversifying radically into any number of ecological
niches.

On the other hand, it's clear from the situation of the U-gas and Kalkars
they have not been on the moon long enough to speciate. There
is no way that the Va Ga can derive from the current human population of
the moon, there simply is not enough time. The sort of time necessary
for these radical adaptations would also result in the loss of the ability
to survive on Earth.

It is possible, and perhaps most likely, that the Va Ga may represent
a previous evolved human population. In which case, human colonization
of the moon's interior comes in two stages.

The first wave is composed of primitive humans, low tech hunter gatherers,
perhaps an original cult of moon-worshippers, who rapidly adapt or
evolve, displacing the far less effective local life to become the apex
creatures in various niches.

Of course, if this is so, then we are doubly confused. Since
not only is it a mystery as to how the Va-gas, or the human ancestors of
the Va-gas arrived on the Moon. It's also a mystery as to how and
why they evolved to their present form.

Astral
Teleportation Revisited

Actually, I first developed this idea in the article “Are
Martians Human” and would recommend you go and read that.
But for the short primer, allow me to offer this:

The most likely means by which humans came to the moon is the Astral
Teleportation. The phenomenon of Astral Teleportation, the
instantaneous transfer of a person from one world to another, and their
materialization in a new and whole body, has been experienced repeatedly
by John Carter, Ulysses
Paxton, Betty Callwell
and Tangor in other
adventures.

John Carter might have been a fluke, a star crossing freak. But
the fact that at least three other persons have accomplished the journey
suggests that it is a rare but real inherent human potential in the Burroughs
universe. If these people have managed the journey in our age,
then we must assume that in the vast distances of the past, other people,
perhaps hundreds, perhaps even thousands or tens of thousands, must have
accomplished the same trip. In fact, it may once have been
far more common, in ages of mysticism and magic than in our rational age.

Indeed, assuming that this sort of Astral Teleportation takes place, the
moon, as the most prominent object in the sky, would be one of the most
likely targets. . . particularly for primitive cultures that worshipped
the Moon. John Carter and Ulysses Paxton travelled to Barsoom,
in part, because in their moments of transfiguration, that was the target
they selected and willed themselves too. For primitive peoples, the
moon would be the biggest and most obvious target.

But the thing with Astral Teleportation is that the man or woman who
arrives is not precisely, or perhaps in not precisely the same body that
they left Earth in. Both Tangor and Ulysses Paxton receive horrific
injuries on Earth. Yet their bodies on other worlds are miraculously
restored with all faculties intact.

Some features are carried over. The ethnic make up, skin colour,
genotypical features, even Earth born strength and reflexes and even presumably
hair and hair style. But if Tangor materializes in one piece
and Paxton has his legs back, clearly some adaptation, has gone on.
This adaptation may be more extensive and subtle than we realize.

John Carter, for instance, arrives on Mars able to breathe, not bothered
by the temperature fluctuations or lack of humidity, able to eat local
food, and untroubled by local diseases. There doesn't seem
to be any good reason why he simply didn't choke out his last few days
as a frozen, fever wracked, starving asthmatic gasping for breath.

Instead, he takes to an alien atmosphere, alien chemicals in the water
and food, alien biology, alien dust and microbes in the air, all like a
duck to water. And he discovers that he's cross fertile with
a woman who lays eggs? So, it seems that there is a profound and
subtle adaptation process that is involved in transliterating humans from
one world to another.
There may simply be a range of adaptation, so that some visitors to
Mars have brief unadapted lives, choking to death on alien pollen, some
wind up like John Carter, and some wind up radically mutated.

I have argued that anomalies in human populations on other worlds, like
the egg laying of Martian females, might be the result of this ‘adaptation’,
incorporating local biology into their systems. I've even argued
that other intelligent species, like the green men of Barsoom, might be
originally human, but so mutated or transformed by the incorporation of
local biology that they are no longer human and no longer capable of Astral
Teleportation (which means no Green Men on the moon and no Va Ga on Mars).

It seems likely that as part of the adaptation to the alien world, there
is sometimes the incorporation to varying degrees of alien genetic material
in some way. It seems more viable to survive by incorporating
alien traits, than to try to randomly develop new traits independently.
The early or original human populations, on a virgin world, may have found
it difficult not to mutate. Or it's even possible that the
early human travellers arrived mutated or with the seeds of mutation.

So, based on this reasoning, it is entirely possible that the transfer
of initial human populations to the moon carried inherent mutating effects.
Humans did not simply arrive on the moon. But they arrived with varying
degrees of adaptation, and some arrived mutated. At least some
of the mutated humans may have been Va-Gas or the predecessors of Va-Gas.
There may well have been a series of other adapted human types, in addition
to the Va Ga.

The mammalian biology is so much more efficient than the local biologies,
that actual hybrids would simply not be able to compete with their less
adapted brethren. On Barsoom, the animal biology is robust and aggressive,
hence a biological human/local hybrid like the Green Man would thrive.
On the moon, a human/local biology hybrid would be a sitting duck for the
more closely human types. The local animal life was so comparatively
weak that a true hybrid would always be weaker than the human or mutated
human stock. Hence the clearly terrestrial nature of the Va Ga.

Nevertheless, the planet was ripe with relatively primitive and weak
species occupying all sorts of niches. Even a mutated human
was so far ahead on the evolutionary ladder that he had a fair chance of
establishing himself and kicking the original species out of its niche,
or even establishing a new niche.

It is likely that there was an adaptive radiation and more speculation
than the Va-gas. One might imagine lion-like predators, wandering
herbivorous giants and even mer-men or seal men. The lunar ecology
is probably a simplified realm much earlier in evolution, which would limit
the ecological niches available.

Ultimately, of course, the Va-gas either succeeded in wiping out their
other mutant human competitors, and perhaps a great many other species
as well. Or perhaps the Va-gas were the loan survivors of the eventual
establishment of a civilization by later appearing true humans.

Finally, allow me to offer one final thought. The profusion
and diversity of life on other worlds in the solar system, such as Venus
and Mars, and including worlds where normally life of our sort should be
completely impossible, such as Jupiter and the Moon, may indicate that
Astral-Teleportation is not a singular phenomenon confined to humans.

In our universe, these worlds are all uninhabited and uninhabitable.
In Burroughs universe, not only are they inhabited, but they sport earth
normal environments tolerable to humans, and while the flora and fauna
differ, they are similar to the point of being interchangeably edible.
Thus, Julian eats moon food, Carter dines on both Barsoom and Garobus,
and Carson feasts on Venus. The only way this seems possible,
is if there is some force which has ‘redefined’ these worlds to Earth norms
and Earth compatibility.

I would suggest that there is a sort of planetary astral-teleportation
which does not simply create a new body for a man or animal out of local
elements, but instead, literally recreates the surface of a world to make
it hospitable for life.

It might be a Gaean Effect, a broad planetary feature of the world's
bio-magnetic aura. From time to time, perhaps in times of worldwide
crisis including eminent mass extinction, the collective life force or
life forms of Earth can astrally project the planet's life force, or perhaps
a clone of the life force, out into space towards another world.
Upon contact with the world, the collective life force or life forces mutate
to adapt to a new world, while also seeking to adapt it.

It is likely that once that life is established on another world, it
has its own bio-magnetic aura that resists further large scale colonization.
Instead, the new flora and fauna simply go their own way.

Hence, my suggestion is that not only are humans and va-gas derived
from Earth at different times, but so, ultimately, are all of the Moon's
life forms.

A
Reconstructed History of Life on the Moon

Approximately four billion years ago, the Moon and Earth, as well as other
planets are formed. The Moon and Earth, and likely other inner planets,
form as hollow worlds, with small dwarf singularities in the centre.

The singularity inside the moon attracts a vast heavy atmosphere which
also surrounds the moon. Eventually, the singularity goes dormant
as a carbon shell crystallizes around it just outside its event horizon.

The moon is at first geologically active with volcanoes, earthquakes and
tectonic plate motion. Numerous Hoos open as a result of tectonic
activity. Over time, this activity slows down and cools, the
moon dies geologically. During this time, it experiences tidal
lock with Earth, showing the same face always to Earth.

Approximately two hundred million years ago, at around the time of the
Permian extinction, the Gaean life force of Earth projects itself, or a
copy or fragment of itself, to the Moon. This causes the transformation
of the Moon's inner and outer surfaces and a flowering of life, mostly
similar to Permian species. During the early mutation phase,
some interior plants are shifted to electrosynthesis and some exterior
plants are adapted to the brutal solar conditions.

Life quickly fails on the Moon's surface, although a relic ecology of hardy
plants manages to adapt to a crude 28 day cycle and survive.
Animals are reduced perhaps to insects, or vanish entirely.
The relic life of the surface does not advance. The surface remains
inhospitable and uninhabitable.

Life on the inside establishes itself, and establishes its own Gaean bio-magnetic
field, thus fending off future Gaean fields from Earth. The
interior surface area is only about the size of North America, and large
parts of that are taken up by three Oceans. The result, biologically,
is a relatively small, backwards bio-continent effectively no larger than
South America or Australia, which makes evolution difficult.
Further compounding evolution's handicaps, the weather is unchanging without
real seasons or day/night cycles, there is no more geological activity,
hence no more plate movements with continents or islands joining or rejoining,
there are no ice ages, no droughts, no floods. In short, there
is no evolutionary or adaptive pressure. Largely shielded on
the inside of the world, there is not even radiation to cause mutation.

Over the next two hundred million years, the life inside the moon evolves
extremely slowly. Meanwhile, Mars and Venus are colonized by
Gaean bio-magnetic fields which radically transform those worlds, a process
which in turn, radically transforms the life forms inside the Gaean field.
With large new worlds of fifty to two hundred million square mile areas,
and with substantial evolutionary pressures from geography, weather, seasons
and climate, the Martian and Venerian life evolve and maintain a comparable
degree of sophistication with evolving terrestrial life.

During this period, the lunar life makes a few strides, developing powered
flight with the flying toads, evolving snakes and predators, and probably
evolving a diversity of large carnivorous and animal life forms.
The overall level remains primitive, and the life mostly consists of cold
blooded sprawlers. But because of lack of competition, the ‘lizards’
are able to grow larger and more diverse than they ever did on Earth.
Plants evolve more rapidly, developing fruits and berries to facilitate
their reproduction.

At some point, a Gaean bio-magnetic field manages to transform a segment
of Jupiter in a way that has some degree of long term stability.
Also, other Gaean bio-magnetic fields, either from Earth, or possibly from
Mars or Venus, and either clones or fragments, wind up reaching worlds
in interstellar space, such as Poloda.

Approximately 100,000 years ago. Humans develop with the faculty
of personal astral teleportation. This early ability is imperfect,
however, and humans materializing on other worlds, a process they do not
truly comprehend, are often imperfect, mutated or crossed with other life.

Pure, mutated and hybrid humans begin to appear on the inner surface of
the Moon.

Pure, mutated and hybrid humans begin to appear on other worlds, particularly
Mars and Venus.

Hybrid humans fail on the Moon. But mutated species establish themselves,
including the Va-Gas. There is an initial round of extinctions
as the Va-Gas, other mutant species, and true humans establish themselves.

On Mars hybrid humans and true humans flourish, but mutated humans die
off. Meanwhile, on Venus, Hybrid, Mutated and True humans all
flourish in different environments.

Around ten thousand years ago there is a wave of true humans arriving on
the Moon. These true humans are from an early civilization or proto-civilization
and have mastered the rudiments of agriculture, metallurgy, bows and arrows,
urban living and military tactics. Faced with a strange new
world, these scattered humans unite with each other and with other true
human groups to form the first lunar civilization.

This civilization quickly dominates or destroys other human and mutant
groups and dominates the interior world. Science and technology
progress on a trial and error basis, and they master the use of electricity,
employing it for transportation, communication and industry. Among
the accomplishments are flying ships and railway trains. Their
science, however, remains crude and primitive, and they have no clear idea
of their place in the universe.

Accompanied by their rise comes runaway overpopulation and reckless exploitation
of resources. There is an ecological crisis, including mass extinctions
of almost all other animal life. Widespread starvation ensues, and
the survivors turn to cannibalism of each other and the Va-gas, the only
surviving mutant species, which returns the favour. There are
massive die offs or population reductions of the human population, and
the Va-gas, a tougher hardier breed experience a renaissance.

The civilization re-establishes itself at a smaller population level based
in defended or fortified cities. It is now a cannibal society,
bent on enslaving and taking the world back from the Va-gas.
It has lost much of its technological proficiency, lacking any underlying
understanding of the science behind its technology in the first place.

Over time, dominance over the Va-gas is re-established. However,
the civilization remains permanently impoverished, both intellectually
and materially. There are large ignorant underclasses, and
a more or less permanent economic depression.

The Kalkar movement begins as a proletarian ‘know nothing’ rebellion.
Similar to both Nazism and Communism, the Kalkar movement despises the
official elites and preaches their destruction, while at the same time
establishing themselves as a secret elite with the trappings of populism.
The old ruling class, isolated, inbred and largely incompetent, are no
match for the new populist movement and fall, one by one.

By the time of Julian, there is only a single city left to the aristocrats
of the old civilization, and even then, they are unable to put aside their
internal squabbles and politics to defend themselves. The Kalkars
rule the Moon. This would hardly be much of a prize since they
inherit a shattered economy, a deteriorating technology and an ecology
laid waste by the most comprehensive mass extinction ever.
However, they have obtained the services of an Earthman, Orthis.....

- The rest, we know....

Appendix
1, Plant Life of the Moon

Outer Surface:Closer observation
revealed the fact of a weird fungus like vegetation which grew so rapidly
that we could clearly discern the phenomena. ....the entire
life span of this vegetation is encompassed in a single sidereal month.
From the spore it developed in the short period of a trifle over 27 days
into a mighty plant that is sometimes hundreds of feet in height.
The branches are angular and grotesque, the leaves broad and thick and
in the plants which we discerned, the seven primary colours were distinctly
represented. As each portion of the moon passed slowly into
shadow, the vegetation first drooped, then wilted, then crumbled to the
ground, apparently disintegrating almost immediately into a fine dust like
powder. (Chapter 1)

Inner Surface:There were forests,
too - strange forests, of strange trees, so unearthly in appearance as
to suggest the weird phantasmagoria of a dream..... The ground about
us was covered with rank vegetation of pale hues - lavenders, violets,
pinks and yellows predominating. Pink grasses which became distinctly
flesh coloured at maturity grew in abundance, and the stalks of most of
the flowering plants were of this same peculiar hue. The flowers
themselves were often of highly complex form, of pale shades, of great
size and beauty. There were low shrubs that bore a berry like fruit
and many of the trees of the forest carried fruit of considerable size
and a variety of colours. (Chapter Three)

Lunar vegetation reproduces itself entirely independent
of any seasonal restrictions, the frequency and temperature of the rains
having seemingly, the greatest influence in the matter. A period
of drought and cold rains retards growth and germination, while frequent
warm rains have an opposite effect, the result being that you find vegetation
of the same variety in all stages of development, growing side by side
- blossoms upon one tree, fruit upon another and the dry seed pods upon
a third. (Chapter Five)

Appendix
2: Critters on the MoonSURFACE

(On the outer surface of the Moon)
Jay and Orthis were positive that they discerned some form of animal life,
either insect or reptilian. These I did not see, though I did
perceive many of the broad flat leaves which seemed to been partially eaten.
(Chapter 1)

RYMPTH

A five foot snake with four frog like legs and
a flat head with a single eye in the centre of the forehead. Its
legs were very short, and as it moved along the ground it both wriggled
like a true snake and scrambled with its four short legs. We watched
it to the edge of the river and saw it dive in and disappear beneath the
surface. (Chapter Three)

Rympth is the name of the four legged snake of
Va-nah, the inner lunar world, and considered the lowest and most disgusting
of created things... (Chapter Six)

FLYING TOADS

We already had seen evidences of life of a low
order, both reptile and insect, or perhaps it would be better to describe
the latter as flying reptiles, as they later proved to be - toad like creatures
with the wings of bats, that flitted among the fleshy boughs of the forest,
emitting plaintive cries. (Chapter Three)

The flying toads darted from tree to tree about
us, uttering their weird and plaintive cries, while upon several occasions,
as in the past, we saw four legged snakes such as we had seen upon the
day of our landing. Neither the toads nor the snakes bothered us,
seeming only to wish to avoid us. (Chapter Three)

TOR-HO

"We know of no other dangerous beast, except the
Tor Ho. They are seldom seen." (Chapter Seven)

There
was always the danger, she told me, of our being attacked by tor-hos.
These blood thirsty creatures, while rare, were nevertheless very much
to be feared, since not only were they voracious meat eaters and and of
such a savage disposition that they attacked nearly everything they saw
in wanton ferocity, but even a minor wound inflicted by their fangs or
talons often proved fatal, because of the fact that their principal diet
was the poisonous flesh of the rympth and flying toad.....
It stood between eighteen inches and two feet in height, had long, sharp
fangs, four legs and was hairless. (Chapter Seven)

There leaped from the concealment of the bushes
a creature about the size of a North American mountain lion, though quite
evidently a reptile and probably a tor-ho, as such it proved to be.
There was something about the head and face which suggested the cat family
to me, yet there was really no resemblance between it and any of the earthly
felines It came at me with those terrible curved fangs bared
and bristling.... It emitted the most terrifying sounds - I have
called them screams.... and yet they were a combination of shrieks and
moans. (Chapter Seven)

The creature was covering the ground at tremendous
speed.... I did not know of the tremendous vitality of the
creature... What appeared to be cold blood was oozing slowly
from its wounded face.... Time and time again it charged me...
(Chapter Seven)

OTHER REPTILIA

"There is no animal in that part of the interior
lunar world with which I am familiar, that they may eat with safety.
The flying toad and the walking snake and the other reptilia are poisonous,
and they dare not eat them." (Chapter Three)

EXTINCT

"The furniture, though of peculiar design and
elaborately carved with strange figures of unearthly beasts and reptiles...."
(Chapter 9)

"The time had been, I later learned, possibly,
however, ages before, when many other animals roamed the surface of the
inner Moon, but all had become extinct, except our captors and another
creature...." (Chapter Three)